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The first Consumers Electronics Show or CES was held in New York City in June of 1967. In that first show there were only 200 exhibitors and 17,500 attendees. Last year, the show had nearly 2,500 exhibitors, filling 1.4 million net square feet of exhibit space, showcasing their latest products and services to more than 129,000 attendees. Over the years, the CES has introduced many cutting edge products such as the VCR in 1970, the Compact Disc Player in 1981, the Digital Versatile Disc in (would you believe) 1996, the Digital Satellite System in 1998 and even the Microsoft Xbox debuted there in 2001.

This year, the CES was held in the Las Vegas Convention Center, a 3.2 million square foot facility with a show floor roughly the size of three football fields or 2 million square feet.  Products of interest for us, aside from optical drive hardware, software and media, are predicted to be ones that can be used not only with our computers, but also in our living rooms for entertainment. In particular, products that can provide us with high definition content. Blu-ray and HD-DVD representatives were there making their play for our hearts and minds, there was also a focus on wireless technology for home networking, serving entertainment systems such as home theater. The hardware manufacturers will be trying hard to blur the lines between the computer rooms and the entertainment areas of our homes it seems. Also of interest this year, will be the next generation of Digital Rights Management or DRM. With blue laser technologies, we will actually be able to hold the equivalent of a digital master in our hands when we purchase or record the new high definition content that will soon be coming our way.

CD Freaks decided to attend the show this year, where we were able to visit with many manufacturers and software providers. Although we were already known by many, we hope that showing our great interest for knowledge and introducing ourselves in person will strengthen our relationships with the companies that our readers are interested in. This in turn will help to keep all of our members abreast of the exciting future that lies ahead for us. From what we saw at the show, there is certainly a bright future for optical drive storage, along with all it's related industries and technologies.

On the next few pages we will present some of the products and ideas that we are sure you will be interested in. We will take a look at some of the items that pertain closely to the optical drive industry and try to provide you with technical details and pictures, along with additional information provided by representatives from your favorite manufacturers.